Blake Desjarlais

[Business of Supply, February 16th, 2023]

Madam Speaker, I believe the government can enforce the Canada Health Act in a way that is consistent with the goal of ensuring we have equity right across the country.

The problem I have is the fact that we have an existing public health care system that, if funded properly, could work really well. However, this idea that we could break the existing public health care system and then find innovative “solutions” amounts to privatization. In my province of Alberta, it is already happening.

Therefore, something has gone wrong. Either the government is not enforcing the Canada Health Act or it is ignoring the reality that, in Alberta, private health care is happening. People are paying money for their very basic needs in order to survive.

[Business of Supply, February 16th, 2023]

Madam Speaker, today we are talking about health care, something that Canadians value.

Our health care system is the very backbone of our social safety net, no matter who we are, how much we make, where we live or in what circumstances we may find ourselves. It is the core value that Canadians right across the country praise, and it is at risk today. There is an insidious and nefarious project under way in Canada that would seek to take away that very protection.

It has already begun In my home province of Alberta. The premier of Alberta is utilizing existing public funds to funnel into the private health care system, funds that would otherwise be used for public care. This cannibalizes our existing public health care system.

It is a fallacy, a myth that the private health care system can make things better. It is no secret to the many Canadians who had to put up this fight before, including the New Democratic Party, which has always been steadfast in the defence of our public health care system, that the provinces would seek to defund and take away the supports of our public health care system. This would ensure that the public would begin to see that deterioration, which would build public support for private health care systems. That is what is happening right now. Our public health care system is falling victim to a classic privatization trap, whether with respect to education or health care, that would seek to destroy our social safety net.

I look at my home province and the real people who have been saved through public health care. The fight began and grew on the Prairies. The intent of the Canada Health Act was to ensure that no matter who we were, whether it was the neighbours we farmed with, or the post office person, or the teacher or the person constructing our roads, and regardless of how the economy may have hurt us, we would have that basic level of humanity.

It is not the job of the government to look solely at the GDP of the country. It is important it ensures that the people who develop the means and the surpluses to make so much possible in our country have control and benefit from those surpluses. Part of that is ensuring that the basic need of health care is looked after.

Imagine our country seeking to seize on Danielle Smith's project to give everyone $375 in an account to privatize the health care system in my province. If that were implemented that right across the country, millions of our most vulnerable people would be left behind.

As evidence of this, Premier Danielle Smith published a paper at the University of Calgary's School of Public Policy, where she suggested creating annual health co-pay fees of up to $1,000 annually based on income.

She has stated that once people get used to the concept of paying out of pocket for more things themselves then “we can change the conversation on health care.”

It is shameful that she would want to shackle the most vulnerable, who need health care the most, to a limit of $1,000. We know that it costs at least $3,000 for one night in the hospital. Who does she want to toss out onto the street? Who does she want to ensure does not get that care?

On top of all of that, the condition of our hospitals today is truly deplorable. Before we get to the point of proposing a solution like Danielle Smith's, we have to break the system first. We have to break public health care. That starts with attacking our public health care workers and our care economy.

The brave men, women and non-binary folks who work in our health care system today are the same people who helped us through one of our country's worst nightmares, the global pandemic, which would have left millions of Canadians behind if we did not have a public health care system.

Even though health care is massively underfunded, and the conditions these workers were placed in, they stepped up. The House praised them. The Conservatives, the Bloc, the Liberals called them heroes.

When I talk to health care workers in my province today, they feel like zeroes, because that is what they are getting at the bargaining table and in their contracts. When we value our health care professionals and those who work in the profession, we value our health care system. These people are not looking for profits. They are looking for the tools to help their neighbours, their family members, the people they grew up with and the provinces they love. However, the conditions they are working in are forcing them into a narrow corner. They have to make a decision to either leave the health care system altogether or enter a growing private sector that would seek to abuse them, that would seek to take away their rights and that would seek to take profit from those who are sick. It is a shame.

Alberta can be a prosperous, beautiful, strong and resilient place so long as we ensure that the principles we have agreed to in our provincial health bill, which is our public health care system, are truly adhered to and valued. Part of that is looking back at that history and at those who experienced the health care system before it became a socialized system.

I talked to a retired nurse in my riding. Just last weekend said asked me to please stop the privatization of health care. She knew exactly what that felt like because she had lived through it before. In Alberta and other provinces, before our national health care program was built, and is still being built and defended today, she had to go through the onerous process of having to ask someone to insure her husband's life. When she could not afford to make those payments, the insurer said “too bad, so sad”. Her husband needed insulin and medical attention. Her husband worked on a farm his whole life and was a hard worker, and there are realities to that kind of labour. When we do not provide that social safety net for those who rely on it most, we leave them behind and it hurts our economy.

We need to take a stand against U.S.-style for-profit health care, and that is part of the problem. We have megacorporations that would love to dine out on the public dollar, that would love to continue to make a killing off people who need that support.

Our job in this place is to ensure that Canadians have the tools and the social safety net to succeed when they fall down, because we are all human, so they can get back up. Canadians are fighting for that today. That is the progress New Democrats are fighting for today, a truly universally accepted public health care system that can withstand the labour conditions we put on individuals who give themselves to our country and who find themselves lesser for it; and a government that is not willing to ensure they have that health care. It is for those teachers, so they can ensure that no matter what happens to them, especially throughout COVID, they can continue to do the work of standing on the front lines.

The working class of our country are being divided and they are being attacked, and it is being done so we do not look at the real problem. Those corporations that would seek to profit, and the politicians they pay for, ignore this issue. They want us to ignore the fact that our public health care system is under attack. They want us to ignore the fact that for-profit surgeries are already taking place in my home province of Alberta.

The Liberal government needs to enforce the Canada Health Act. It is written clearly. It needs to do that and ensure that people like Danielle Smith cannot continue to finance the private health care system like she is today. I welcome the Liberals to Alberta to take a look at some of the private health care systems, because they obviously do not believe it. They should talk to the people who need this service. They should talk to them about how much it costs to get a hip replacement.

We are here to defend public health care, and we will continue to do that.

[Business of Supply, February 16th, 2023]

Madam Speaker, I want to start with the fact that, yes, it is New Democrats' dream to one day see a universally administered, universally accessible health care system in this country. If that is our dream, we are the Bloc Québécois's nightmare because this piece of legislation, this work and the funding models that need to be put in place are the kinds of things Canadians expect from coast to coast to coast.

The reality is that we are living in a confederacy; our country was founded on the principle of confederacy, and that model came from indigenous nations. If the Bloc members would look at a history book, they would realize that those indigenous nations actually bound together in their confederacies to work with one another and to help one another, rather than block the health care that people in my province, people in Saskatchewan and the good people of Manitoba would otherwise benefit from.

I do appreciate this member's speech, but it does not go far enough to protect Canadians from coast to coast to coast. Can the member explain what his plan is to ensure that other Canadians have the opportunities that Quebec may have?

[Criminal Code, February 15th, 2023]

Madam Speaker, I want to thank my hon. colleague for what I think is an important intervention.

I will agree with him in some part that this is an important moment for Canadians. Hopefully, this bill allows us the time to contemplate what the important steps will be to ensure that we listen to community members. This means not only those who are suffering from mental illness but also those who are combatting poverty and their contributors to it. Then, we can actually have a chance to do this work during this period and do the things that we need this law to do to ensure that vulnerable folks do not fall victim to an easy way out.

Could the member ensure that the government works hard to do the consultation, talk to those folks and make sure that there are pathways before this becomes the decision they do not have to make?

[Criminal Code, February 15th, 2023]

Madam Speaker, I just align with one of my colleagues, the hon. member for New Westminster—Burnaby, in relation to doing everything we can for those who may be suffering before it gets to the point of an application for medical assistance in dying.

Earlier today, for example, one of our colleagues gathered folks who were suffering from immense pain and living day by day, not knowing what to do. That pain contributes to their overwhelming feeling of despair, which then leads them to apply for something like medical assistance in dying. In fact, the government could put in place regulations to support these folks before they get to that place. They could ensure psilocybin, a treatment that they are calling for; they have already established a right to have access to this treatment. Would the member speak to the importance of ensuring that we do everything we can to support these folks, including providing medicine that they desperately need?

[Criminal Code, February 15th, 2023]

Madam Speaker, I want to thank my hon. colleague, who often speaks in this place about the need for justice and the need to ensure that those who are left behind actually get support.

I often find myself thinking about solutions. New Democrats have tabled solutions to fix one of the core drivers of the mental health crisis in Canada, which is poverty. Poverty is one of the greatest contributors to the mental health crisis in this country. We have tabled solutions, and I understand the Conservatives may disagree with some of those solutions. One of them is the guaranteed livable basic income.

Could the member, given the kind of description of the problems of poverty and the effects it has on mental health, offer at least one solution so those who are struggling to pay their rent and struggling to pay for their groceries can ensure that they get that kind of support? Could the member elaborate on that?

[Criminal Code, February 13th, 2023]

Madam Speaker, I asked my Conservative colleague, who spoke just prior to this colleague of mine, the same question I will ask him. It is in relation to trying to deter one of the main contributors to the mental health crisis in Canada, and his colleagues have mentioned this all day, which is poverty.

New Democrats have tabled a solution, which is a guaranteed livable basic income. I understand the Conservatives might disagree with that, but what solutions can the Conservative Party offer, and not criticisms but solutions, to ensure those who are most vulnerable, those living in poverty and those who do not have the means to survive actually have that support so they can live with dignity?

[Criminal Code, February 13th, 2023]

Madam Speaker, in light of this important bill, there is a need to push it to a place where the government and members of this House have an opportunity to hear more. We need to ensure that those who are desperate, in need and seeking the kind of support that mental health supports can provide them actually have those resources and can get them without seeking MAID. I support the member in his call for that.

However, I also support the need to ensure that those who are furthest behind and need support get that support through the mental health transfer or other means, like a guaranteed livable basic income. That is an important piece to this.

Can the member elaborate on the need to ensure that we support those who are living in poverty with real tools and solutions so they can live with dignity?

[Criminal Code, February 13th, 2023]

Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague for what I believe is an important intervention and intersection between health care, mental health and this bill. Of course, it is no secret that Canadians from coast to coast to coast are enduring an incredible level of poverty. Poverty is one of the driving forces that contribute to folks' mental health and the fact that they cannot see a light at the end of that tunnel when they fall behind.

Does the member support the New Democratic Party's call for a guaranteed livable basic income, which would raise folks out of this kind of poverty? I hear the Conservatives laughing right now about this, but a guaranteed livable basic income would ensure that folks actually have a chance to get out of poverty to begin a path of recovery. The member just stated that he believes everyone deserves a chance at recovery and that everyone can. Does he support this bill, which would ensure everyone has the resources to survive?

[Petitions, February 10th, 2023]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to present a petition on behalf of folks across the Prairies, particularly in Alberta, who have had bad dealings with oil companies. Oil companies have abandoned their contaminated assets and have left vulnerable families, like the Jessa family in my home province of Alberta, with the bill. The companies are not cleaning it up. This petition calls for companies to be held accountable, but is also calling on the government to support those families in ensuring that the assets are cleaned up.